Nandita Das’ recently-released Manto, which is her love letter to the Urdu writer, has got both critics and cine-goers talking.
Along with Nandita’s meticulous attention to detail and Nawazuddin Siddiqui’s terrific portrayal of the short-story writer, one actor who is attracting attention, for her poignant rendition of Manto’s wife Safia, is Rasika Dugal. It is Rasika’s Safia that makes us meet the troubled, flawed man behind the writer.
However, the 33-year-old actor, who has worked in films like Agyaat (2009) and Qissa (2015), and is largely associated with serious, indie films, says she’s open to working in all kinds of movies but it’s the filmmakers who try to pigeonhole actors.
“I have always been a lover of films in their entirety. I celebrate mainstream cinema as much as I love working independent films. So I am not discriminating. It’s the mainstream people who discriminate because I haven’t got a role which is exciting enough in mainstream cinema,” Rasika told News18.
“I have always been offered small parts (in mainstream films) which have not interested me. I have never got a meaty role. But if it (a glamorous role) comes to me, I’d embrace it with open arms and definitely try it out,” she added.
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Praising Nandita for the hard work she has put in to bringing the project to fruition, Rasika said, “The film has so much of anecdotal information which Nandita got from spending time with Manto and Safia’s daughters and with Safia’s sister Zakia in Pakistan. Information that’s otherwise not available anywhere else and would have been lost had she not done this research and incorporated all of these details beautifully into the script.”
Calling working with Nandita an experience she’ll cherish all her life, Rasika says she is now friends with the 48-year-old actor-filmmaker. “What I found really beautiful about working with Nandita is her attention to detail, which I think is a mark of a good director. I am also very particular about the details of everything I do. So both of us understood each other very well that way. We shared a very beautiful working relationship and now we are friends,” she said.
Though Rasika says she is looking forward to working with all kinds of directors, she has her list sorted. Sitting right at the top of it is the man behind the Maqbool-Omkara-Haider trilogy. “If I had to pick only one, it’ll have to be Vishal Bhardwaj,” she says.
She will next be seen in a film called Hamid and two web-shows — Mirzapur and Delhi Police.
Follow @sneha_bengani for more.
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